19 June 2011

The Middle East & Red Riders

I had a big weekend of music. It started with The Middle East at the Metro on Friday night and finished with Red Riders' last ever concert at the Oxford Art Factory (video above of Ordinary from that performance) on Saturday night. Both events were fantastic and well worth the money.

The Middle East were a complete surprise. I know their music from their self-titled EP and the more recent album I Want That You Are Always Happy, but in concert I think their music is much deeper, heavier and it has so much more energy. They really seem to enjoy playing and performing and right from the first note it was clear that they had a really big sound and stage presence. As with their album there was heaps of variety in the playing with most band members playing several instruments as they wandered through their amazing repertoire. To me it seemed that they had a long background in live performance and after having seen them now it seems their studio recordings, whilst beautiful, just don't capture the energy and richness they display on stage. They're brilliant.

Red Riders also really enjoyed playing their concert. They seemed to treat it all as a celebration of their musical history and they dropped a couple of hints that it isn't all completely over. They will probably do some individual work or reform in another combination. Guitarist Brad Heald is back with The Vines. I hope all that talent just isn't wasted.

I think I mostly enjoyed the music they played in the second half of this gig (from Drown in Colours) when Brad replaced Adrian Deutsch on stage. His guitar work on Tomorrow/Today and Ordinary is very special. Tomorrow/Today was probably my highlight from this performance. I'd rate Drown in Colours as one of the best albums I own. They are (or maybe were now) such an under-rated band.

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Sidknee

About Me

I work at UTS
Library and we are planning a brave new library and laying a framework for it that includes an automated library retrieval system, RFID, a
much improved resource discovery system and a new service model for academic
libraries. It won't be more of the same.

I was formerly Head of the Research Centre at
the Australian War Memorial and responsible for Web Strategy, including Web 2.0
initiatives. From 2006 to 2008 I curated the Lawrence of Arabia & the
Light Horse exhibition and in late 2008 I made the first curatorial
visit to a war zone by one of the Memorial's librarian/archivists to identify,
record and collect records of war from Australian forces before they withdrew
from Iraq.

I like bikes, cameras, films and music. I'm trying to learn more about digital photography & enjoying living in Sydney.